Cassandra’s Dream (2008)
It has been a few weeks since I watched Woody Allen’s Cassandra’s Dream, and I didn’t take notes, so please forgive me if I forget which esteemed thinkers were dropped in the name of self-justification; in the service of apologizing for a continued interest in B-movie tropes (Match Point made an in-joke of this tendency). I have a continued interest in B-movie tropes myself, and I probably even share with Allen a certain shame of this preoccupation, but one either has to embrace one’s loves or move on-something we thought Allen had grappled with thirty years ago. Allen’s frequent world, a Godless, corrupt place where amorality reigns and love is illusory, used to be an exhilarating tonic to the false, sun-up platitudes of most mainstream pictures. Woody Allen used to be bracing and frank; he used to be one of sharpest, most virtuosic, just simply funny, deflators of pretense working in the cinema.
Then Allen decided he was supposed to grow (and visually he has), and he, for the most part, became embarrassed of his wild-id. Match Point was heralded as a comeback, and it has a force-but it’s a remake of a not bad but rigged picture that hasn’t held up that well (Crimes and Misdemeanors). Match Point is a more successful picture than Crimes and Misdemeanors, because Allen’s head was at least partially in his crotch while making it, but it’s, thematically, the same-indulging in Allen fashion parade cynicism. Match Point is still novel though-it’s shockingly erotic (Allen again playing your preconceptions of his films against you), with a clever, nasty twist-ending. The performances vary somewhat, but Jonathan Rhys-Myers and Mathew Goode are terrific-shifty, funny, entitled, and greedy, with hair-trigger timing. Match Point is, above everything-a good time, a black exhilaration; Woody Allen perhaps acknowledging his sour-puss predictability and having a little fun with it-indulging his inner Fatal Attraction (without that movie’s loathsome cowardice).
Cassandra’s Dream is consciously similar to Match Point. There’s the same inevitable fatalism, the same fixation on rot in high places, the same noir trappings. But the juice has been dried out-Cassandra’s Dream could be Match Point as jerky. The dialogue is plastic and expository (Myers and Goode covered that up in Match Point, though Johansson had less luck), and the scenes that one expects in these type of films, the scenes that carry the primary dramatic thrust (the murder scenes), have been pointedly omitted. This is not a failure of Allen’s, but clearly part of the design. Cassandra’s Dream isn’t interested in “thrilling” but in reveling in the same state of twitchy, blossoming guilt that faced Martin Landau in Misdemeanors.
The problem is that Allen would appear to have nothing interesting left to say about guilt-he’s returned to the territory, not out of throbbing concern, but out of neurotic habit. (Guilt is to Allen what The Sorrow and the Pity was to Alvy Singer.) And there’s nothing at stake-Allen’s pessimism tips us off and numbs us from the start-there’s no shock-no slow-dawning horror. (This picture plays like a reaction to Match Point in more ways than one-one can’t help but feel that Allen thought he got his hands too dirty in that picture. It wasn’t high-brow and clean enough for him. Too many dirty thrills-the violence is too immediate and personal-too sickening.) The crime here is a proposition made by a corrupt uncle to his two nephews; that, if carried out, will bail all three of them out of their potential financial ruin. The uncle is Tom Wilkinson; the nephews are Colin Farrell and Ewan McGregor. The casting is the reason to see the movie.
Farrell and McGregor aren’t given roles here as substantial as Myers and Goode, but they are nearly as effective, and Allen, wisely, casts counter to our instincts. This gimmick is about the only thing going on in the movie. Farrell is the brother crippled by guilt: he senses their souls’ erosion as they buy into Wilkinson’s chilling self-serving rational. Farrell’s suffering here plays as the other side of his work in In Bruges. Farrell, stranded in most pictures prior to 2008, is beginning to find roles that exploit his contradictory-cocksure-inner-fire. Prior movies couldn’t get past Farrell’s looks-they tried to elevate him to Movie God, only to largely render themselves (and him) forgettable. These new roles also take into account the fact that Farrell is not a very large man, and poignantly exploit that. Farrell twitches and bends and moves franticly back and forth-conveying the weight of something pushing him further and further in. Farrell tests McGregor’s character here, tempting McGregor to consider a direction he didn’t think he had in him, and Farrell’s vulnerability lends the film a hint of that sickening horror that Allen seems desperate to avoid. Farrell makes McGregor, who’s also as good as I’ve seen in years, even better.
Allen’s approach isn’t entirely bogus-the flip, offhand presentation of the murder-for-hire is chilling, and puts us on McGregor’s business-just-business wavelength. The picture’s contrary, elusive stubbornness does have a certain pull-the ending is also a major intentional anti-climax, and, while you feel cheated, there’s a certain random forgettable they-were-just-two-more-guys-with-a-plan hopelessness to it that authentically haunts. But how many times are we supposed to enjoy drinking from this well? Has Allen totally forgotten the happy surprise of the finale of Hannah and Her Sisters? Or, more recently, the wounded, delicate Sweet and Lowdown, the best picture Allen’s made in the last ten years? Cassandra’s Dream is another faux-tragedy, but the real tragedy is watching a Master filmmaker underrate himself.
★★½
July 1st, 2008 at 2:20 pm
Ouch. Bummer.
July 1st, 2008 at 11:13 pm
You’re really right about Crimes and Misdemeanors not holding up, Chuck. To me, it’s really one of Woody Allen’s most “uncomfortable” films, by which I mean it feels positively clunky and disjointed now whereas years ago it seemed sprightly and spry. Meanwhile, Husbands and Wives feels more nakedly true than most of his films as the years pass.
Cassandra’s Dream feels like it truly is bogged down by all the problems you describe (Allen’s guilt about the sharpness of Match Point–a film I have mixed, almost negative feelings about, too, though I’d rate it as significantly more successful than his latest–perhaps being the biggest). The casting helps, but only so much.
I really, truly hope Vicky Christina Barcelona is Allen’s “comeback” from seven years of mediocrity. I still like his run of Sweet and Lowdown, Small Time Crooks and, I think, the very underrated (by Allen himself, apparently, who called it his worst movie ever) Curse of the Jade Scorpion. Since then, though, his films more or less all taste like jerky, though Match Point much less so than the others.
July 2nd, 2008 at 3:55 am
I’m hoping for VICKY CHRISTINA BARCELONA too Alexander, and I’ll never not see a Woody Allen movie, he’s too strong to ignore. I’m glad to hear a shout-out for SMALL TIME CROOKS, because I enjoyed that as well, and I actually also enjoyed the nonsense of SCOOP-it was playtime, no more, no less.
It wasn’t in the last ten years (just missed it) but my favorite sorta recent Allen movie apart from SWEET AND LOWDOWN is DECONSTRUCTING HARRY. Didn’t care for the ending though, Allen should let the audience decide whether to forgive or not, instead of forgiving himself.
July 2nd, 2008 at 9:06 am
Yeah, I almost brought Deconstructing Harry into the discussion, as part of that aforementioned stretch of his, but then I’d have to rightly dismiss Celebrity as the outright dud it is.
Deconstructing Harry is quite the nasty, brutal film, though. It showed a side of Allen that normally doesn’t get out. The ending is ironically where the momentum of the film dies out, and I agree on top of that Allen forgiving himself sort of deflates what came before, but it still has an edge that has to be recognized.
July 2nd, 2008 at 10:36 am
I love DECONSTRUCTING HARY. It’s just kinda great to hear Woody swear like a sailor. And it’s funny all the way through.
July 2nd, 2008 at 3:46 pm
Very interesting analysis of Farrell’s past roles, and his and McGregor’s play off of each other here. I definitely prefer the Farrell of 2008 than that of years past.
July 3rd, 2008 at 5:44 am
My impression was that this didn’t share its DNA so much with Match Point as it did with Sidney Lumet’s Before the Devil Knows You’re Dead (which is, of course, superior).
For Allen, my take on his ‘fall from grace’ (as it were) has more to do with his prolific output than with he himself. Any artist who churns out as many films as he does is going to drain the well dry. That, I think, is inevitable. If you look at most accomplished filmmakers, they have a new film every 2-3 years, correct? In the case of some (Terrence Malick), that extends to full decades between works. Allen has done a film a year since Annie Hall in ‘77. Literally a film a year. That’s insane. No director can produce a ‘great hit’ every year for 3 decades.
Take John Ford, for example. IMDB says he directed 145 films. He was whipping out 2-3 a year in some cases. Now see how many of those on the list you recognize…a small percentage in relation to the whole output.
I imagine if Allen spaced his films out a bit more there would be more consistency in the quality. In fact, it’s kind of amazing that he manages to be ‘on’ as often as he is.
With all that said, Cassandra’s Dream is still pretty bad and everything you mentioned is right on.
July 6th, 2008 at 7:13 pm
Thought I’d chime in defense of CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS. Surprised to see so many people talking about how it doesn’t hold up. I, and most of the Allen fans I know, consider it to be one of Woody Allen’s masterpieces right up there with MANHATTAN. It’s surprising to hear folks talk about it as a “clunky” film. But perhaps this is what comes out of making a film a year. Some folks love CRIMES while others prefer SMALL TIME CROOKS, etc. They all have merit, though some are more effective for me than others. As for MATCH POINT, I didn’t see it at all being a remake or CRIMES, but in actuality a remake of AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY. Almost beat for beat.
July 6th, 2008 at 11:47 pm
Yes, Match Point is definitely something of a remake of An American Tragedy, quite true, Hal.
I’m not sure why my opinion of Crimes and Misdemeanors keeps deflating as the years go by. It may be that Allen has borrowed bits and pieces, and in the case of Match Point, whole swaths, out of its hide since, and all of the borrowing and stealing has strangely resulted in fainter love for the original article.
July 7th, 2008 at 7:40 am
Daniel-Thank you much.
Evan-Yeah, the speed at which Allen works probably has something to do with some of his pictures being problematic, though I respect his urge, his probable need, to keep knocking these pictures out. They don’t always work, but the guy is a true filmmaker-a man who HAS to be doing what he’s doing.
Glad to hear from you Hal-I’ve gotten in trouble with Woody fans (though I am one) before for voicing dissatisfaction with CRIMES. I loved it when I first caught it near its release, but CRIMES just hasn’t aged well for me. I think it’s a thesis picture, and Allen never allows his characters to act contrary to that thesis. Many, quite brilliant, filmmakers do that, of course, and it irritates me more often than not.
MATCH POINT undeniably owes AN AMERICAN TRAGEDY quite a bit, but it’s also a sexier play on the same dilemma that greeted Landau in CRIMES. I think Alexander is on to something, in returning to this formula so often, Allen may be, even if it’s unreasonable, retroactively wearing out even the older films. I’m not saying CRIMES AND MISDEMEANORS is a bad movie, only a problematic one.
I do love MANHATTAN though.